A full-blooded Irishman, Bernard "Bun" Ryan, grew up in the small mining town of Leadville, Colorado. His father died when he was six, and Bun and his siblings were raised by his mother, who struggled to meet her family’s needs.

Bun was working for the J.C. Penney Company in Taos when he visited Los Alamos to play a softball game. He applied for a job at Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory and was hired in 1951, and he and his wife, Jean moved to Los Alamos. LASL's S-Site softball team won two consecutive state championships in 1951 and 1952. In 1953, Bun pitched his first game for Pierotti's Clowns, an amateur five-man softball team. By 1977, the Clowns had amassed a record of 176 wins and 23 losses.

Known for his work with Alcoholics Anonymous and the LANL Employee Assistance program, Bun says he'll be involved with AA "until the day I die."

Additional biographical material can be found in the Los Alamos Monitor of September 19, 1999.

Written by Karen Nilsson Brandt, copyright ©